A Framework on New Travel Demand Model Based on Potential Travelers and Surrounding Land Uses for Rapid Transit

One of the public transports is rapid transit, which provides the highest performance mode of urban transportation. Currently, existing rapid transit travel demand analysis from the service provider is based on ticketing data that contain information such as time travel, origin and destination; which is using trip based method. This method has its limitation such as the demand is for trip making rather than for activities as well as having spatial, temporal and demographic aggregation errors. It also failed to predict the travel demand when there is future development or growth in the surrounding area. Therefore, new method for modeling travel demand is needed. This paper proposes a framework of new model and analytics for travel demands of rapid transits based on big data of potential travelers and surrounding land uses. Land uses and transportation are interdependent. With this proposed concept, the accurate travel demand for rapid transit in the future will be met. Therefore, the rapid transit service will have excellence operation, which includes optimum frequency, punctuality and reliable service

Compressive spectrum sensing using two-stage scheme for cognitive radio networks

The modern applications of communications that use wideband signals suffer the lacking since the resources of this kind of signals are limited especially for fifth generation (5G). The Compressive Spectrum Sensing (COMPSS) techniques address such issues to reuse the detected signals in the networks and applications of 5G. However, the raw techniques of COMPSS have low compression ratio and high computational complexity rather than high level of noise variance. In this paper, a hybrid COMPSS scheme has been developed for both non-cooperative and cooperative cognitive radio networks. The proposed scheme compiles on discrete wavelet transform – single resolution (DWT-SR) cascaded with discrete cosine transform (DCT). The first is constructed according to the pyramid algorithm to achieve 50% while the second performed 30% compression ratios. The simulation and analytic results reveal the significant detection performance of the proposed technique is better than that of the raw COMPSS techniques

Reformation of corporate governance in Malaysia : do changes in audit and accountability practices increase institutional performance?

Following a sequence of financial crises around the world, a series of corporate governance codes were issued concerning best practice with regard to corporate governance reformation. Central to these codes was the aim of the government to create investor confidence, to raise the standard, drive corporate governance reforms and use as a benchmark monitoring and implementing as corporate governance practices and policies at the corporate company level. The Malaysian government is committed to ensure that corporate companies demonstrate a track record of good governance in order to attract and retain long-term investors. Therefore, after seven years, the first Malaysian Code on Corporate governance (MCCG) was introduced in 2000, while the revised MCCG was introduced in 2007. The amendments of MCCG 2000 involved the components of audit committees and board of directors. It was aimed to improve the quality of audit committees and board of director’s functions among Publicly Listed Companies (PLCs) in promoting accountability and high levels of protection for the investor. This article aims to examine the effect of the Malaysian Code on Corporate governance on audit and accountability practices by comparing practices prior to, and after the implementation of the Code. Furthermore, the relationship between changes in audit and accountability practices and institutional performance in terms of corporate governance reformation is also examined

Modeling sheep pox disease from the 1994-1998 epidemic in Evros Prefecture, Greece.

Sheep pox is a highly transmissible disease which can cause serious loss of livestock and can therefore have major economic impact. We present data from sheep pox epidemics which occurred between 1994 and 1998. The data include weekly records of infected farms as well as a number of covariates. We implement Bayesian stochastic regression models which, in addition to various explanatory variables like seasonal and environmental/meteorological factors, also contain serial correlation structure based on variants of the Ornstein–Uhlenbeck process. We take a predictive view in model selection by utilizing deviance-based measures. The results indicate that seasonality and the number of infected farms are important predictors for sheep pox incidence

An Analysis of Human Silhouettes with Normalised Silhouettes Images and Shape Fourier Descriptors

This paper aims to investigate the human silhouettes in video frames, which involves normalizing the silhouettes and describing the shape of the region in video frames using Shape Fourier Descriptors. Shape Fourier Descriptor describes the shape of an object by considering its boundaries, which are the shape centroid and calculated by a particular formula through all the video frames after normalized the videos. This shows the changes of the objects with various actions and can be recognized and characterized human or non-human in the video frames. Normalized Silhouette Image is significant before the videos are being processed to describe in descriptors. It focuses on the region based on the object’s ratio in images of the shape of the object and silhouette images are centred after action segmentation. This reduces the burden of the process of extract unnecessary part in whole videos. Various human action videos and animal videos are used for the training and testing in this study to make sure the system performed better

Validating the ISO 9000 Construct of Measurement Instrument Through Application of RASCH Model

There are numerous researches conducted on the issues related to ISO 9001 quality management system. Among the issue is the impact of the ISO 9001 quality management system implementation on the performance of the organization. However the findings from the research appeared as inconclusive. Few literature suggest that the inconclusive result may due to the level of ISO 9000 implementation therefore further research is required. Generally the data collected for these types of researches are through mailed questionnaires and analyzed it using SPSS and SEM. In line with that this study also developed questionnaires correspond to a 5 point Likert to assess the implementation of ISO 9000 in the organization. As a result 231 items are identified within five dimensions. The five dimensions are derived from ISO 9001 and ISO 9004 quality management standards requirement and guidelines. Among the dimensions are management responsibility, resource management, product realization, measurement improvement and innovation and organizational performance. The questionnaires are sent to 78 automotive based companies located in the Northern region of Peninsular Malaysia. 19 questionnaires were returned and used as pilot test to validate and calibrate the instrument. The responds from the organization are tabulated and run in WinSteps software for the purpose of validating and calibrating the instrument by implementing the Rasch ‘quality control' and reduction of items. Not all the outfit items are removed from the instruments, Rasch Model did provide room for the researcher to make decision either to remove or not those outfit items. In this study those outfit items need to be corrected in order to ensure that the instrument is reliable and fit to measure the performance of the organization. As a result 68 items are removed from the questionnaires

Antimicrobial properties of optimized microwave-assisted Pyroligneous Acid from oil palm fiber

The demands for an antimicrobial agent of natural origin has increasingly grown in recent years due to the adverse health effects from the long-term application of conventional chemical-based agent. To date, there are very few reports available on the use of pyroligneous acid produced in optimized condition, as antimicrobial agent. Thus, this study reports on the evaluation of the antimicrobial properties of oil palm fiber-derived pyroligneous acid produced using microwave heating at optimum condition (MWPA). The optimized MWPA was concentrated and extracted using ethyl acetate and was further determined for its antimicrobial properties against Gram positive and Gram negative bacterial strains through Minimum Inhibitory Concentration (MIC) and Minimum Biocidal Concentration (MBC) analysis. Results obtained shows that MWPA exhibited high inhibition zone that varied between 13 ± 0.58 to 28.67 ± 0.88 mm toward all strains screened in the present study with low range of MIC value from 0.651 ± 0.13 to 1.563 ± 0.00 mg/ml. This indicated that CPAEA MWPA derived from OPF exhibited a strong antimicrobial activity and might be projected as alternative natural source as antimicrobial agent

Low threshold linear cavity mode-locked fiber laser using microfiber-based carbon nanotube saturable absorber

In this work, we demonstrate a linear cavity mode-locked erbium-doped fiber laser in C-band wavelength region. The passive mode-locking is achieved using a microfiber-based carbon nanotube saturable absorber. The carbon nanotube saturable absorber has low saturation fluence of 0.98 µJ/cm2. Together with the linear cavity architecture, the fiber laser starts to produce soliton pulses at low pump power of 22.6 mW. The proposed fiber laser generates fundamental soliton pulses with a center wavelength, pulse width, and repetition rate of 1557.1 nm, 820 fs, and 5.41 MHz, respectively. This mode-locked laser scheme presents a viable option in the development of low threshold ultrashort pulse system for deployment as a seed laser

Solar irradiance uncertainty management based on Monte Carlo-beta probability density function: case in Malaysian tropical climate

In recent years, solar PV power generation has seen a rapid growth due to environmental benefits and zero fuel costs. In Malaysia, due to its location near the equator, makes solar energy the most utilized renewable energy resources. Unlike conventional power generation, solar energy is considered as uncertain generation sources which will cause unstable energy supplied. The uncertainty of solar resource needs to be managed for the planning of the PV system to produce its maximum power. The statistical method is the most prominent to manage and model the solar irradiance uncertainty patterns. Based on one-minute time interval meteorological data taken in Pekan, Pahang, West Malaysia, the Monte Carlo-Beta probability density function (Beta PDF) is performed to model continuous random variable of solar irradiance. The uncertainty studies are needed to optimally plan the photovoltaic system for the development of solar PV technologies in generating electricity and enhance the utilization of renewable energy; especially in tropical climate region